By Jim Coffman
NFL training camps don’t open until the coming week (the Bears’ first practice is on Wednesday!), but plenty of prominent writers and yakkers weighed in with all sorts of pre-season palaver the past few days. And it was a week in which Chicago’s baseball big-wigs were losing (three-game series’ over the weekend), lounging (during the All-Star break) or locked into little roles (at the big game). So let’s start the football free-for-all a little early. One issue in particular demands immediate inspection.
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Why are so many national football analysts so absolutely convinced that Kyle Orton won’t be a successful NFL quarterback? You cannot find an assessment of the Bears’ off-season that doesn’t mock the Monsters for not upgrading under center – the obvious implication being that Orton and Rex Grossman have no chance back there. Now, I’m not sure any NFL quarterback could excel with the Bears’ current crop of wide receivers, but that’s not what folks are talking about. They’re dismissing Orton and Grossman without a second thought and killing the Bears for not having brought in someone else.
So what if even a cursory glance back reminds that there weren’t any difference-makers available in free agency this year. I suppose the Bears should have taken a quarterback in the second round of the draft (they weren’t taking one in the first with potentially special left tackle Chris Williams available – the only thing loopier than throwing an unprepared young quarterback into the fire is throwing him in there with sub-par protection on his blind side). One problem though: Whoever they might have taken wouldn’t have helped this year. And that’s what we’re talking about right? The 2008 season?
The Bears’ draft pick who has a chance to help this year is the fourth-round one from three years ago. Orton may be a question mark but he is much less of one than the Packers’ Aaron Rodgers or the Vikings’ Tarvaris Jackson. The former Boilermaker’s career has obviously been too short to draw big ol’ conclusions, but when Orton has been in command, his team has won.
Now, this column is predicated on the idea that surely the Bears will go ahead and give their fourth-year signal-caller a shot at the start of the coming season. I haven’t tapped into the extreme negativity that has so frequently shadowed Rex Grossman (people often note how long it takes for effective NFL quarterbacks to develop, then turn around and heap scorn on young QBs who don’t figure it all out in their first four or five years). Then again, he was bad enough early last season and has been injury-prone enough throughout his career to justify trying our guy. The key numbers are as follows: Orton won 10 games as a starter three years ago and he looked good in his last two starts at the end of last season.
But those games didn’t matter, you say? It’s easy to play well when your team is out of contention? But the teams the Bears played in those games (the Packers and the Saints) were still in the mix for home field advantage throughout the playoffs and for a wild card, respectively. There is also Orton’s collegiate record. All the guy did was lead Purdue to four straight bowls from 2001-04, throwing about a million passes along the way. The Bears may sign Chris Simms or whoever else but they won’t know Ron Turner’s system like Orton knows it. Case closed.
And while I’m here, how can precious sports page space be wasted on ridiculous pictures and stories touting Brett Favre as the answer to the Bears’ supposed quarterback woes? If Favre comes back the Bears want to play against him – they’ve kicked his butt the last few years.
Creepy Cubs
At the beginning of last week, I thought if the Cubs could just avoid being swept in series’ on the road the rest of the way they would almost certainly win the division or at least clinch the wild card (this squad will keep winning at home – this much I know). Then the Cardinals and the Brewers sweep series’ over the weekend to pick up a couple games apiece and a little doubt creeps in. Maybe Kyle Orton could start working on a split-finger fastball.
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Jim Coffman appears in this space every Monday with the best sports wrap-up in the city. You can write to him personally! Please include a real name if you would like your comments to be considered for publication.
Posted on July 21, 2008